Moonfall

4.

Moonbase, Main Plaza. 12:36 P.M.

Rick's unruffled inclination to calculate the political implications ahead of more humane considerations did not spring from callousness so much as a simple unwillingness to believe that anyone was actually going to die at Moonbase. Rick lived in a world of image and manipulation, a world that was essentially free of violence. Nobody ever really got hurt. Not physically. For him, the issue was how the vice president would look while the senior executives were trying to sort things out.

Maybe the experts were wrong and it would just be a matter of coming back later to pick up whoever got left. The comet, after all, was coming down on the back side of the Moon. His job was to see to Charlie Haskell's nomination, and therefore to avoid the potentially devastating political fallout from the event. He obviously couldn't stay, so the sooner Charlie Haskell was on board the plane and headed home, the better.

There was a small crowd gathered at the tram station in Main Plaza, waiting to be taken over to the Spaceport. He stood off to one side, the few possessions he could salvage packed in a briefcase. People were talking about what they would do when they got home. Whether there would be an effort by Moonbase International to find jobs for them. About how sorry they felt for the six who were staying.

The tram arrived and everyone climbed aboard. A recorded voice warned them to be seated. When they had, the vehicle began to move.

Two professorial types took seats in front of Rick. One wore a black woolen sweater against the swirl of air in the open vehicle. He was speaking intently, but Rick caught one word: chaplain.

The tram moved into a thick patch of forest. Rick edged forward.

"You're sure?"

"Yes. I saw the list just before I came over. Did you know him?" Both speakers wore glasses, and both were neatly barbered.

"Just from the bridge club."

Rick recalled the nervous-looking man on the speaker's platform and wondered why they were talking about him in the past tense.

A fair approximation of sunlight filtered through the overhang. The air smelled of spring.

Rick leaned forward. "Pardon me," he said, "did something happen to him?"

Both men turned. "To whom?"

"To the chaplain."

"He's staying behind," said the man with the sweater.

Birds sang, and a chipmunk stood atop a log, watching them pass. The two men returned to their conversation. And Rick found the news disquieting.

The tram entered a tunnel. Lights blinked on and shadows raced along the walls. After a few minutes they turned into a curve and began to slow. The recorded voice advised them that the vehicle would be stopping momentarily.

He leaned back.

"None of this is your responsibility, Monica." Female voice behind him, husky, angry. "You're just like me. We're low-graded employees. We take our paychecks and we do our jobs. We never got paid for anything like this. It's not our responsibility."

"Whose responsibility is it?"

"People like Hampton. Look, the executives of the world take the money, give all the orders, get all the perks, and when the load of shit comes in, they're supposed to deal with it. They are. Not you. Not me."

The tram began to slow. It glided to a halt, rocked gently from side to side, settled onto a platform, and stopped. The gates whispered open.

"You want to go down there and sign on? I'm sure they'd be glad to have you," the husky voice said.

Rick watched the two women get off. They were both in their twenties. Both attractive. One black, one white.

"Just don't forget," said the black woman, "dead's forever."

The passengers filed out and rode an escalator up to a higher level, where they followed a passageway and divided into waiting areas marked YELLOW and GREEN. Rick's boarding document indicated GREEN.

The launchpads were visible through wall-length Plexiglas. The Micro crouched in its network of umbilicals and screening. Jets of steam escaped from its underbelly. Technicians were going over her, checking off items on notepads. He heard static on the public address system, and then a voice: "Passengers on the yellow flight are boarding now. Green flight is running about ten minutes behind."

A few people got up, said their good-byes, and wandered out through a doorway.

The vice president of the United States was standing off to one side of the service desk. He looked lost. Rick glanced at Sam Anderson, who made a sour face and shrugged. Rick felt as if he were living in one of those alternate realities so popular in the cinema.

"You okay, Charlie?" he asked.

Charlie shook himself. "Yeah," he said. "I'm fine."

Rick produced a sheet of paper. "I've put together a statement for you. I think we should release it as soon as we're on the plane."

He glanced over it but did not appear to read it.

"It just says you're leaving under protest, that you want to stay on here but the president insists you return immediately, and that you see no recourse, and so on."

"Good." Haskell looked as if he'd aged overnight. A couple of people came over and asked to shake his hand. Pleasure to meet you, Mr. Vice President, they said. And, Good luck in the primaries. No assumption here he'd get the nomination. When they left, Charlie shook his head but said nothing.

Rick was silent for a time. "I heard," he said, "that the chaplain's staying, too."

"The chaplain?" Charlie's eyes narrowed.

"Yeah," said Rick. "I thought the same thing."

More hand-shakers appeared. The vice president was his usual cordial self. He had the gift of making the person to whom he was speaking feel as if his entire day had been directed toward that meeting. He was happy to make their acquaintance, he said. And he was proud of what they'd accomplished.

"What same thing?" he asked Rick when they were alone again.

"Well, you know. The chaplain doesn't look like the kind of guy who'd do that."

Haskell closed his eyes momentarily. The public address system announced that GREEN flight was ready to board.

"Time to go," said Rick.

The vice president didn't move for a long time. Finally he shook his head. "No," he said. "I can't do this." He turned to Sam, who was developing a horror-struck expression. "You and your people get on the flight," he said. "See that someone gets my ticket."

"I can't do that," protested Sam.

"Do it. I'll see that your protests go on record." He shook hands with Rick and thanked him.

"What are you doing?" asked Rick.

"I'm not sure," said Charlie. "But I know what I can't do." Copenhagen Flight Deck. 12:51 P.M.

Nora Ehrlich ignited her engines, and let them idle while she glided along her orbital path. Then, at precisely at 1:02 P.M., she applied thrust, and the space plane, carrying 136 passengers, lifted out of orbit and started for home. Moonbase, Grissom Country. 1:47 P.M.

Evelyn Hampton had left Moonbase evacuation to Jack Chandler, and had devoted her time to preparing Moonbase International to deal with the situation. She'd nominated the person whom she wished to succeed her, had developed a strategy that might allow the corporation, after going Chapter Eleven, to revive itself in a new form. "We can't just give up," she'd told the board of directors. "The technologies now exist to expand beyond Earth. The experience with Tomiko should not deter us; rather, it should serve as a warning." For a start, she thought, there was Project Skybolt, an orbiting laser system that would have been capable of slicing incoming asteroids into rubble. But the program had inevitably been perceived as pork. It was an easy target for budget cutters, and after fifteen years and several abortive starts, it had still not gotten off the drawing boards. Even Culpepper had opposed it. We don't need it at this time. It would not, of course, have been much use against Tomiko, but it might have been nice to have in the aftermath of the collision if pieces of the moon began drifting earthward. If we learn nothing else from this, we now know that the hazards are very real and there's a legitimate need for planetary defenses. But there's more to it. A lot more.

Expansion seemed to be built into the genes of the species. Expand or stagnate. But the Western governments were heavily in debt. If there was going to be a drive off-planet, private interests would have to show the way, would have to demonstrate a payoff. It would have to become a moneymaker.

That hadn't happened yet. Wouldn't have happened for years to come. But there were still off-world industries to be developed. And if the Moon has been here just long enough to allow us to use it as a springboard, then we should be grateful for that.

The important thing now, she told MBI, is that we do not go back into the shell. The current generation has the equipment and the knowledge to begin the process. If these people are forced into other lines of work, if the buses and ferries and SSTOs are mothballed, then it'll be over. Certainly for our lifetimes. Maybe forever.

She prepared a few farewells that she'd send out tomorrow, if necessary. She was spending much of her time now in Jack Chandler's company. Unspoken communications passed between them, a glance, a smile, a shrug. They'd always been close, but now she felt a connection that went beyond anything she had ever felt with another human being. It was as if a psychic link now existed, enabling her to read his thoughts and share his emotions.

And the chaplain. Mark Pinnacle. Mousy little man who'd looked so frightened on the speaker's platform. Who would have thought? She'd been delighted to hear of his offer. It had allowed her to call in Chip Mansfield and tell him he was off the hook. And if somebody else would agree to stay, she could get rid of Benning, who was next in line. She hated the notion of spending the last hours of her life with people who'd stayed only because someone had forced them into it. Better to die with the valiant.

She climbed out of her jumpsuit. It'd been a long day and she ached for a shower. She could justify it now: There was no further need to conserve water.

The telephone rang as she stepped into the stall, but she didn't bother with it. Get it when she came out. The ultimate emergency had broken over her head and nothing was going to rush her again. Not in this life.

Evelyn had been born in Dakar. Her father had been a British missionary, her mother a teacher of French literature at Senegal University. Evelyn had announced early that she wanted to become a physician. She'd seen firsthand the living conditions of the tribes, and she was going to do what she could. It was an admirable ambition, but one that faded in high school when she discovered a distaste for chemistry and physics.

She went to the University of Versailles, where she concluded that a great deal more money was to be made by bringing fantasy to the middle class rather than medical repairs to the poor. Virtual reality was about to arrive on African shores in all its manifestations, diagnostic, cinematic, therapeutic, analytic. Evelyn did not yet have her bachelor's degree when she founded MicroTech, Ltd., hired a secretary, and secured licenses from poorly informed bureaucrats.

From that moment she controlled the growth of the industry in and around Senegal. She profited handsomely from her monopoly, expanded into Mauritania, Ghana, Sierra Leone, and the Ivory Coast. Organized crime tried to move in on her, but she hired her own elite security force, and in the end she was tougher than they were. All of this took place just before the African boom. When it came, Evelyn parlayed it into a seat on the board of Global Communications, Ltd.

She was in the right spot when the nations decided they wanted to establish a permanent presence on the Moon and they needed a corporation to help them do it.

For a while it was MicroTech all over again, except on a global level. She was Time's Woman of the Year in 2022, she employed a half-dozen Nobel prize winners, and she was on first-name terms with prime ministers and presidents. Her ghostwritten book, Moon Over Wall Street, was enjoying its fifty-seventh week on the New York Times best-seller list.

She'd married twice. Marcus Hampton had been gunned down during the war with the east African thugs. William had gotten the wrong idea about her, thinking she'd consent to be part of a harem. She didn't know where he was now.

She had one son by Marcus, who lived with her in Roxbury. He was at MIT, working on a doctorate. Old enough to deal with the loss of his mother. Should it come to that.

The phone was ringing again when she shut the water off. She strode out of the bathroom, toweling herself as she went. "Hampton," she said. Her name, spoken by her voice, activated the instrument.

"Evelyn." It was Chandler. "I just got a message from Ops."

"What's wrong, Jack?"

"The flight left without Haskell."

She needed a moment to digest that. "How'd it happen?"

"He and his party apparently walked. One of them delivered the tickets and told our people to give the seats to somebody else. He was up here several minutes ago."

"Did he explain why? Why he didn't go?"

"No. But he's on his way over to see you."

"Okay," she said. "Thanks, Jack. I assume we filled the seats."

"Yes."

"Okay. Put them on the morning flight tomorrow."

"Yes, ma'am."

She heard raised voices in the corridor. "I think he's here, Jack. I'll talk to you later."

She grabbed a robe, drew it around her shoulders, and turned to face the door. Moonbase, Grissom Country. 2:06 P.M.

Charlie Haskell was no hero. He admired heroes, was always ready to quote TR or Churchill, and had twice presided over the Veterans Day ceremonies. But he'd never in his life been called on to perform an act that could be described as heroic. He'd confronted a bully or two, and once stood up to a tyrannical geometry teacher. The memory of that long-ago day had flashed briefly, absurdly, through his memory as he sat on the tram, surrounded by Rick and his frustrated agents, riding back to Main Plaza.

Frustration had been the order of the afternoon. He'd insisted his agents board their scheduled flight. They'd refused. And Rick, who usually looked after himself first, had picked this moment to step out of character. He'd argued that Charlie couldn't possibly stay, couldn't consider it, owed it to the American people to get home, was too valuable to lose. Which is to say, even Rick couldn't come up with a compelling reason for him to save his skin.

Charlie had no family that was dependent on him, no one who would be terribly hurt if something happened to him. And no real reason for existing, other than his job, which someone had once described as consisting of three duties: to go fishing, to preside over the Senate, and to wait for the president to die.

Rick had argued all the way down to Evelyn's apartment.

But it seemed to Charlie as if his whole life had been a preparation for this terrible moment. He thought of himself as a national leader. He enjoyed the trappings of his position, luxuriated in the celebrity, rubbed shoulders with the powerful, toured the country clubs. Now had come the moment to lead.

He'd sat on the tram, listening to Rick. He pictured himself in the White House next year, if he got lucky, trying to drive from his mind the knowledge that someone braver than he had died in his place. He couldn't even remember the chaplain's name. His heart had been pounding. Later he would come to believe that the decision had been taken hours earlier, that it had been a left-brain thing, that it was just a matter of waiting for his conscious mind to catch up. And maybe there was some truth to that.

Charlie had tried to call the president from the tram. He had a code that got him through the Moonbase commcenter without a hitch, but Henry had been in a meeting. He'll call you back, sir. So he left a message explaining what he had done. That, of course, had put him across the Rubicon.

Then he'd gone looking for Evelyn. If he was going to take this kind of step, he wanted at least to relish the pleasure of telling her personally. He wondered why it was so important to him to gain her respect. But now he stood outside her door, telling Rick and his embattled agents to go away, waiting for her to answer, feeling elated and terrified and very pleased with himself.

He was surprised when the door opened. He'd detected no movement on the other side, but feet padding across a floor were harder to hear in lunar gravity. Evelyn was wrapped in a yellow terry-cloth robe, standing in a puddle, and looking curiously at him. "What's going on, Mr. Vice President?"

"I'm not sure," Charlie said. "May I come in?"

She stood aside. "They tell me you missed your flight."

He glanced back at Rick and Sam, and walked across the threshold. She closed the door behind him.

"I'm staying," he said.

"Staying?"

They looked at each other across a gulf.

"Got any coffee?"

"You and the chaplain," she said almost dreamily. "Why?"

"I kept thinking about MacArthur," he said.

"MacArthur?"

"Twentieth-century American general."

"I know who he was." She frowned. "What's Douglas MacArthur got to do with anything?"

"Are you angry with me?"

"Why would I be angry?" Her voice was icy.

"I really don't know. You sound hostile."

"Tell me about MacArthur."

"In 1942, when the Philippines were about to be overrun by the Japanese, Franklin Roosevelt ordered MacArthur, the commanding general, to slip out. It was the right thing to do because the Allies would need MacArthur. He was worth a couple of divisions. They sneaked him past the enemy fleet, and afterward he became a major force in the war. He was directed to abandon his troops. To save himself. He did, and nothing he did after allowed him to live it down. They called him 'Duck-out Doug.'"

Although Charlie was almost a foot taller than Evelyn, she seemed to be looking down at him. "Forget politics," she said. "You don't have any troops here." She picked up the phone and punched in a number. "Are they confirmed?" she asked.

"Don't," said Charlie.

"Good," she said into the phone. "He'll be on the flight." And she turned to him: "Twelve-fifteen liftoff from the Spaceport tomorrow morning. I've got six seats for you."

Charlie felt a rush of anger. "I'll only need five."

She looked at him for a long moment, glanced at the phone, and sank into a chair. "You're sure?" she asked.

"Yeah. I'm sure. It's harder to cut and run than it is to stay." It occurred to him that history would remember the six who stayed. Probably more clearly than it remembers most vice presidents.